postcards of the hanging

Tag: construction machines

If you had to come back as a monster machine, this one is about as badass as you can get. I can’t believe I just used the word ‘badass’ because I’m not twelve, but really there aren’t many other available words in our lexicon that can describe this thing quite as well (and it’s anatomically accurate too, the big chainsaw thing being at the rear). I saw this machine near Shields Library on the UC Davis campus, I believe its purpose is to open up the Earth’s core and tear out its soul; either way when you show up for work in the morning this is the machine you want to be playing with. Give this one a parking ticket, I dare you, I double-dare you. When you absolutely positively got to rip up every piece of sidewalk on the street, accept no substitute. It looks like something out of Robot Wars. I sketched this in the Seawhite of Brighton sketchbook, with a micro pen that has seen better days.

Back to the old Boiler Building, and the machines are really tearing it down now. The whole east side has been turned to rubble, leaving a sad, draughty, haunted shell. A small crowd of people with young, construction-machine-loving-aged children (you know the age, parents!) to see the mighty mechanical dinosaurs at work, and to wave goodbye to a historic part of UC Davis. Back at work, I spoke about this sad demise of a much-loved campus sight to some of the professors who have taught there for the past few decades. “Where’s this, then?” they said. “Boiler Building? Is that downtown somewhere? Don’t know that one.” Well, I’ll miss it. Even if I too had no idea what it was for until recently.

Yesterday we the sketchers of Davis met at the UC Davis Silo, my usual everyday sketching spot, for the latest ‘Let’s Draw Davis!’ sketchcrawl. There were about thirteen of us all in all, familiar faces and new sketchers also. I love meeting new fellow urban sketchers, but it is especially fun seeing people draw the same things that I sketch on my everyday lunchtimes, in new and different ways. I started by spending a long time drawing this wing of the Silo in brown pen. My son was there sketching with me in the morning; he’s a sketchcrawl veteran now. It was another warm day, so it was nice to sit in the shade. UC Davis is quiet this weekend, but this week thousands of students will return or start their new journeys in Davis, and the craziness begins. I can’t wait of course, being a busy and exciting period of work for me, but at the same time it’s nice to savour the quiet moments when I can.
There’s also a lot of last-minute construction work going on on campus too, it seems. This work machine was parked near the Silo and just begged to be sketched. I drew this in micron pen and coloured it in watercolour. I don’t know what ‘MF’ stands for but I can hazard a guess (it reminded me of “TFU” in the robot wars episode of Spaced).

My last one of the day was a fairly quick one of the back of Hart Hall, and I decided to make it a bit livelier by splattering paint all over the page for a bit of texture. After this we all met in the shade outside Shields Library and looked at each other’s sketchbooks, and talked about pens and paper and methods, which is always fun. The next one will be in October, on the date of the worldwide sketchcrawl; details to come at some point soon!

Another lunchtime sketch; taking a risk with my allergies flaring up like 70’s trousers, so kept it quick, a drawing of a digger outside work. I used the hi-tec c in the stillman & birn gamma book. The workmen came along as I was getting near the end, and were kind enough to let me finish before driving the digger away.

These student housing halls over by Tercero on the UC Davis campus, Pierce Halls, are currently being demolished. I was kindly informed about this last week so raced over this week to capture them before they vanished. I found a quiet spot up a stairwell outside the demolition zone, and listened to the “football weekly extra” podcast (who seemed convinced that Spurs season was also under demolition). I’m glad the big digger stayed still for me, parked like a big mechanical yellow dinosaur awaiting its prey. I can imagine all the student tales from all the years that students lived here. When I was at university I didn’t live in the halls, and while one part of me felt I was missing out, I’m glad I didn’t. I did spend a year living in the student halls while teaching in Charleroi (la Vigie), which was noisy to say the least. I have no idea about American halls though, other than in the movies. Anyway, whatever the hidden histories, they’re all being knocked down now and buried in the rubble.

Beautiful day out today. I mean, freezing this morning, but very sunny by lunchtime, although a bit nippy. I just had to get out and sketch. Despite being ridiculously busy in January, I always enjoy sketching in this month. We often have mild, bright Januarys here. But I didn’t draw a street scene or campus view with the sun shining through bare, leafless trees, because I saw this, a little mini steamroller, sat on Shields Avenue on the UC Davis campus. What a beauty! I’ll draw sunny skies tomorrow. Today was all about steamrollers.

Another one for the boy. This Big Digger was parked on the UC davis campus on Thursday lunchtime, and I sat in the sunshine, lathered in sunscreen, beneath my big black shady hat and sketched it. The fields are the usual end of June brown, despite Tuesday’s shock out-of-character deluge (end of June Brown? she plays Dot Cotton doesn’t she?). We say brown, but it’s yellow ochre, more like gold. California is the golden state after all. I was going to sketch the Robert Mondavi Institute from beyond its vinyards (next week) but this industrial brontosaurus just roared out to be sketched. How could I resist? Drawn with micron pigma 05, coloured with watercolour, on the last day in June. Wow, already June has become July…not long until a certain international symposium..!